I don’t know where you are getting this from. In any place where prostitution has been fully legalized (and this invariably includes mandatory testing), sex workers and their clients who care about their own well-being and security enough to abide by the laws have proven to be the absolute majority.
+1 and thank you for a really intelligent response! I, too, worry about the sex workers who are in a bad situation of abuse. I chose my profession. They did not. I have control over my business; those women do not.
xo
Abortion is legal in the US under most circumstances in which there is demand for it. In countries where that isn’t the case (such as where the law allows it only for rape or serious health/life risk) women whose pregnancies don’t fall within those parameters often turn to illegal abortion.
I agree, but that doesn’t make it any less of a false dichotomy to suggest that the choice is between mandatory testing and stigmatisation. New Zealand and parts of Australia have made significant strides toward destigmatisation without mandatory testing.
Hello? Two of the three places I cited are not even in the United States. And prostitution is legal throughout those two places.
It’s not your statements themselves, but how the policy you advocate works in practice. Imposing conditions such as mandatory testing, licensing and the other common regulations invariably creates a two-tier system - and it’s usually the most vulnerable who end up in the second (illegal) tier. If the purpose of making sex work legal is to protect sex workers, why would you want a legal system that excludes those most in need of protection?
There is a big difference between being regularly tested, and being regularly tested and having to report your results as a condition of your being allowed to work. Sex workers can and do get tested regularly even where nobody is checking their HIV status, you know this. The purpose of mandatory testing is not to protect their sexual health, it’s to protect the public from them.
Wow, you’re wrong on so many counts. First of all, I don’t know of anyplace where prostitution has been “fully legalised”. That would mean that there is no such thing as illegal prostitution, either in practice or in theory, and that is not the case anywhere. If it was, then by definition every sex worker and client would “abide by the laws” because there would be no law for them to break.
Secondly, mandatory testing is not invariably included where prostitution is (generally) legal. New Zealand, New South Wales and the Netherlands are three prominent examples of jurisdictions where there is no mandatory testing. In other parts of Australia (Queensland, Victoria, ACT) it’s effectively mandatory in the brothels but not for sole operators.
Finally, I don’t know how on earth you think you would prove that the number of legal sex workers exceeds the number of illegal sex workers (the latter aren’t exactly lining up to be counted). But to return to the jurisdictions I cited earlier, the illegal industry in Victoria is widely acknowledged as being larger than the legal industry, because street prostitution is totally illegal; brothels are so stringently regulated that it is easier both to run and to get work in the illegal ones; and the registration process to work alone from home involves such a huge invasion of privacy that most sole operators won’t bother with it. In Greece, it is agreed by everyone that only a small minority of sex workers bother with the registration process. I haven’t seen any size estimates for Nevada, but I’d be willing to bet the number of sex workers in the approximately 30 legal brothels is less than the number working illegally in Las Vegas alone, and certainly far less than in Vegas and Reno combined.
I always had the impression that prostitution was banned because the money fueled “organised crime” but that may be just another (political) excuse.
One thing is that banned or not, I’ve seen hooking in one sort or another just about all over the world, with the possible exception of some very small rich dictatures (and I woudn’t bet even there)
Another is a short pique for those who “don’t want hookers down their street”.
I rented a flat in the “red light” area of Paris (at that epoque), supplied with a hefty “matronne” about fiftyish at the street door. She had a studio in the building for her work, shared with two other colleagues. I would defy any housebreaker, salesman, or other unsolicited person to get into that building.
I am not saying we should populate our streets with prostitutes, but I do like familiar faces to say hello to, baker, neighbor, and so on. I could have left my keys to these women for the plumber or electrician, without the sightest hesitation…
Well, first bans on prostitution are a lot older than organized crime. And even if that’s a present rationale it’s a bad one since making something illegal while failing to curtail it only ensures that any profits end up in the hands of criminals.
I think you are right in how different set-ups have different dynamics. It is also true that it is not conducive to sell ‘no’ to potential clients, but some girls are in the position that they can afford it. Don’t get me wrong, most girls will take on anyone (as long as they are clean, respectful, etc.), but they can still ‘discriminate’ between customers.
I don’t want to veer off topic, but I was in a couple of clubs this weekend and of the 4 girls I was with, 2 seem to adjust their ‘service’ to the type of customer. One girl only told me, as part of a general chat, about the difference of being with someone her own age and guys that are a lot older. If this is really the case, I don’t know…she didn’t hold back with me in any case. With the second girl I know for sure. Without going into too many details, she was very gilfriendy with me (ie a lot of kissing), while two other guys that I talked to were told that she ‘doesn’t kiss’. Difference is probably that I’m in my twenties, and those other guys in their 50’s or 60’s.
In any case, I would at least have it legal that a sexworker is allowed to make his or her desicion of taking clients on. Obviously rejecting clients will be bad for business, but that is a risk a sexworker should be able to make on his own. If there is a law that could be interpretated as ‘forcing’ (sorry I’m struggling to find a better word) a prosititute to treat any client (age, race, sex, haircolor) the same; it should be amended or changed if prostitution were to be legalized. But that’s just my opinion.
Your point about not being an asset to a brothel if you reject clients is an extremely important thing to consider (when legalizing brothels/prostitution). I’m really not sure policy makers think these things trough in enough detail. If a brothel can throw you out if you refuse clients, that pretty much means your freedom of declining a customer is compromised. In all honesty, this is probably true for the clubs I go to as well. Maybe that’s why it is almost ‘not done’ to complain about girls (unless they make promises they won’t keep or try to rip you off). That’s a little too much relying on the decency of punters for my money.
What buying sex is concerned, I feel that honesty works best. If a girl doesn’t want to do something, but promises to do it anyway…it will show. Initially I felt a bit uncomfortable this weekend when the 60 year old told me she ‘doesn’t’ kiss while I had just told him she had no problems with kissing. But he immediately said he was glad she was honest, because it well never amount to much if the girl is doing something she doesn’t really want to. Mind you, we’re talking about a 20 year old girl that has been in the job for a matter of weeks. But this all seems again to be very dependent on the dynamic of the business.
…indeed: mandatory testing is not part of the New Zealand legislation. For an insight into the way things work here here are the occupational safety and health guidelines for the sex industry.
http://www.osh.dol.govt.nz/order/catalogue/pdf/sexindustry.pdf
Yes and no - I don’t see why any service should be exempt from customer feedback, and if I go somewhere for a service and am not given it then as a customer I have a right to be pissed off. As a provider of the service, I need to consider my customers’ satisfaction if I want my business to be successful, and if “I” in this case is an individual working for myself then it’s absolutely my decision if I want to discriminate (as BSweet69 has stated she does). If I, on the other hand, is a brothel/club of workers then that’s slightly different.
There is of course a force working in the opposite direction which is that if an establishment fires people who won’t do everything and anything they’re told to, word of mouth is going to make it harder for it to recruit people. Okay, maybe that means they end up taking the desperate people who have no choice, but the world is full of those kinds of establishments and not all of them are in the sex industry - ever walked into a McDonalds?
Because women can’t be allowed to have that much power.
That is correct. Prostitution is completely illegal in Thailand. On the other hand, police own many of the bars and brothels. (I recall one police official being gunned down in Long Gun Bar one afternoon before opening time back in the 1990s. He was the owner, and it was a business dispute.) Police also take a lot of bribes from bars, massage parlors and brothels to look the other way and provide “protection,” a very lucrative business. And testing of staff for STDs/HIV is mandatory, although some establishments are more conscientious about this than others.
The commerce minister in the previous administration was the daughter of the owner of one of the largest massage parlors/brothels in Thailand, Cleopatra Massage. She made no bones about her family background.
I Liked your way better SGT.
I wanted to jump in here and address WhyNot’s question about whether, in legalized prostitution, it would be legal to discriminate. I haven’t been a prostitute, but as most here know I’ve been a stripper for many years. I see legalized prostitution similarly to how things go in the strip club. I can pick and choose who I want to dance for, and if I don’t want to dance for certain types it’s pretty easy to avoid it. But, I think a person who goes into sex work is going to understand that it’s hard to make a living doing this work if you are bigoted or choosy. Obviously, prostitution like Bsweet69 is talking about, and dancing in a club are two different things, but to be successful they both require good people skills and compassion for men. You won’t get very far if you have a long list of what kind of men you won’t perform for.
Also, I always have to laugh and shake my head when the inevitable “those poor women” comments come along. Sex workers are some of the most resourceful, independent women I’ve ever known, far moreso than people I’ve known in other industries. The very nature of the job requires a certain creativity and ability to roll with the punches, not to mention a sense of humor and flair for the weird. Whenever we get painted with the pathetic/desperate/damaged brush, I can’t help but roll my eyes. Sure, a lot of sex workers have had tough lives, but so have all sorts of people, and we land on our feet more often than not.
Exactly. As I said upthread:
It is certainly that way in Thailand, but Westerners prefer to believe all the biased forced-prostitution tales, the vast majority of which are simply not true. The girls I know really take advantage of that when newbie guys come on the scene and try to “rescue” them.
All the cable news channels are constantly spewing programs about sex slavery and sex slaves and kinda imply that all prostitutes are nonconsensual sex slaves who haven’t been liberated from their owner/pimps yet. Sadly, this includes CNN and MSNBC, both channels go at the sex slavery thing like they were Fox News. There is a MOUNTAIN of misinformation out there.
It all depends on the definitions you use and in agree that for most media outlets misinformation is the norm. But let’s just say that worldwide there are plenty of sexworkers that don’t get to ‘keep’ all their earning for themselves; also in western countries with legalized prostitution.